Immy: There’s a strong probability that most of you reading this will develop a disinclination towards me and my pro-valentine’s day gushing but I genuinely love it.
We all love to complain about the overpriced chocolates and cards, the queues outside Oxford’s finest eateries (i.e. the cheapest meal you can get away with without resorting to Hassan’s), and the PDA overkill, but I’d just like to say to all you cynics out there: look away. Just go away. Stop complaining about not being able to go out to dinner because of the surplus of couples and tables-for-two in every restaurant you might want to visit. Why is it that no one ever goes out to dinner in term-time and then suddenly, on Valentine’s day, you’re all moaning about not being able to get a table? If you don’t want to buy chocolates and cards, then don’t. But don’t rain on our parade just because you don’t have anyone to love. The PDAs I can’t explain away as easily, but if you’ve ever lived in a student house with no locks on the bedroom doors, chances are you’ve been in more awkward situations.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m not going to idealise the day for you. It’ll probably be pretty normal, there’ll be no fireworks or candles, long walks on the beach and sunsets, and aside from a more-than-average level of pink and red in shop front windows, you might not even notice. You’ll stick to your usual routine: lectures, library, lunch. Even the alliteration’s depressing. That is, if you’re single.
If you do happen to be in a relationship, then it’ll probably be the same, with one key difference: lectures, library, lunch…love. Even the alliteration’s magical. That half a chocolate bar he left you, the way she touches your hand when you say hello, the look of longing in both of your eyes when you part, they all have that special extra something when it’s Valentine’s day.
Valentine’s Day is a day to really make the most of being with someone. You know that feeling you normally get when you come up behind your boyfriend and give him a massive hug but all of his friends look disapproving? The social stigma attached to Public Displays of Affection doesn’t apply on Valentines Day. Rather than just hugging your boyfriend on Valentines Day why not start passionately making out with him, regardless of whether he’s mid-speech or not. Hell, it’s Valentine’s Day, live a little and have sex in a public location of your choice.
Spending Valentine’s Day together with your other half is an experience only beaten by managing to skip the Park End/Shark End/FUBAR/Lava Ignite queue on a particularly busy Wednesday. All day you can glory in being together, why not get up early for a breakfast together? Go to each other’s lectures just so that you can hold hands? Curl up together for a night in watching P.S. I Love You or The Notebook and talking about how your love is even stronger than theirs? The best thing is that it’s in February, so sharing a bed with someone isn’t the endurance contest that it is by Trinity and actually, if you’re doing it right, normally pretty pleasurable.
People who don’t like Valentine’s Day, who can’t share the love and joy that the rest of us feel, have something wrong with them. It’s a very well known, but still technically unproven, scientific fact. If you’re single Valentine’s Day doesn’t so much represent a day of depression as an opportunity to strike. Everyone who is single on Valentine’s Day is acutely aware of the fact that they will probably die alone and unloved. As such everybody’s looking to hook up. That hot Blues Rugby guy who never returns your calls? Drop him a text on Valentine’s Day and he’ll be round before you’ve even pulled up those suspenders.
If you don’t fancy remedying your single status this Valentines Day, it’s impossible to argue that Valentine’s Day represents anything other than one of the best opportunities to wallow each year. Nobody can judge you for consuming over four litres of Haagen Daaz, with some Ben and Jerries thrown in for variety, while watching more chick flicks than journal articles you’ve read so far this year. This presents a prime opportunity to pity yourself, knowing that tomorrow you can continue on your life as normal with all that existential angst out of your system, having been replaced with a slighter larger waistline and indigestion, along with an inability to watch Hugh Grant films.
*The views in this article do not necessarily match those of the writer.
Matt: It’s that time of the year again. One of the most polarising days of the year, normally dependent on whether you’re spending it with a loved one or sobbing into a tub of ice cream while you comfort eat through Notting Hill. I’m personally not a fan. Given the amount of anguish it causes, Valentine’s Day just seems a bit unnecessary.
It’s not even just about being alone on Valentine’s Day that causes me to hate it, I’ve spent plenty of other Valentines Day’s in the company of the fairer sex that have caused me just as much discomfort. A particular low occurred last year.Having been tipped off by a well meaning, but unfortunately for me misguided, friend that a girl I had been ‘seeing’ for a while was expecting something for Valentine’s Day, I set off to Sainsbury’s to purchase some of the finest chocolates I could find. I arrived at hers with some Guylian’s Sea Shells that had been reduced by 50% – maybe not the finest chocolates but we’re living in times of austerity – and we settled down to watch a film. Halfway through, with the perfect moment still eluding me, I whipped out my gift to be met with complete silence. Turns out she wasn’t really ‘a Valentine’s Day sort of person’.
I wouldn’t be surprised if Valentine’s Day alone was enough to restore the British economy’s growth as anyone shopping for anything vaguely related to Valentine’s Day seems to lose all notion of a fair price. Boxes of chocolates, half of which nobody in the world will ever eat because they’re flavours such as ‘Pistachio Cream’, are sold for ten pounds. Cards that will take longer to choose than the time they stay out of the bin/drawer are sold for four pounds. Set menus (easily the worst culprit) featuring a small piece of pork/chicken/beef/dog and some ice cream are only 25 pounds (you’re paying for the ‘ambience’). I’m pretty sure that McDonald’s would have a set menu for the night if they thought they could get away with it. I’m even more sure that people would pay for it.
If you are unfortunate enough to be alone on Valentine’s Day my advice is to call Nightline to be on the safe side. The day is so hyped up, with couples discussing their plans weeks in advance and comparing what they are going to do, that you almost fool yourself into thinking that you want the day to arrive just so that it’ll hurry up being over. Then it does and you immediately regret it. Public Displays of Affection take place left, right and centre with the entire world seemingly in couples: couples sitting outside the Rad Cam, couples in hall, couples sharing desks at the library and couples comforting each other through their respective essay crises. It’s as if all of the single people have rushed out to find someone, anyone, to cuddle in the middle of the road just so people know that they are not, in fact, alone. My advice is to put on some music to distract yourself from the world around you. I find Slipknot normally does the trick.
While music may be good to distract yourself, the mediums of film and TV are equally as obsessed by Valentine’s Day. What is worse is that no great cultural piece has ever emerged from Valentine’s Day (unless you count the film Valentine’s Day, in which case I don’t think you quite understand culture, or film, or the word ‘great’). Instead we’re treated to the standard and predictable tale of a singleton who seems unlovable but eventually finds love. This scenario could exactly be described as mood-lifting unless you consider yourself a masochist. If that’s the case, then you won’t be needing a DVD today, head straight to the cinema for some seriously depressing couple time.
Alternatively, ask a coupled-up friend what their plans are. The look on their face as they describe how they’re just ‘going to have a night in, because they don’t need to do anything special now – their love is so cemented they’re just happy to be together doing nothing’, is enough to make you feel more nauseous than the morning after a particularly heavy crewdate.
What’s worse is that no matter how hard you’ve prepared for Valentine’s Day, whether you’ve made reservations or detailed plans, you’re always left that little disappointed. That’s because it’s been hyped out of all proportion, presented as a day to celebrate ever lasting love that you have to shoehorn your own situation into. So this year, cancel that table at GBK and just have a laugh with your friends. I’ll see you at Camera, I’ll be the one without the other half…
